A Lesson Before Dying

Diagnosed with cancer, Dennis Frederick stayed in the classroom to
teach about death

In the cluster of homes surrounding Pleasantview Elementary School and
extending down the gently sloping hill toward the Mississippi River,
twinkling bulbs dangle from rooftop rain gutters and peek out from
snow-dusted trees and bushes. Overlooking it all, at the crest of the
hill, is a huge five-pointed star, shining from high atop a spindly
tower. In the weeks approaching the holidays, the town of Sauk Rapids,
Minnesota, looks like a scene from a child's model-train set.

Like most of the world, Sauk Rapids is waiting for Christmas. So it
is in Dennis Frederick's 3rd grade classroom at Pleasantview, where
candy-colored construction paper Christmas lights are strung from wall
to wall. But Frederick, a longtime teacher at Pleasantview, rarely gets
the chance to share in his students' anticipation. A little more than
two years ago, he was diagnosed with colon cancer. He was 35 when he
learned the news. Hopeful of beating the disease, he took a leave of
absence from school and endured a year of chemotherapy and
radiationonly to find the cancer had spread. Last May, doctors
predicted he had six months to live. Given the option for more
aggressive therapy, he declined. Instead, he made plans to return, for
as long as he was physically able, to the place where he has been
happiest, back to the classroom and his kids.

"I never thought that I would not go back,'' he explains, "even
though I was tired, even though I didn't feel good. I looked forward to
seeing the kids.'' When school opened this fall, Frederick resolved to
teach with the vigor and enthusiasm that are his trademark in Sauk
Rapids. He would make the year the best of his career. What's more, he
would integrate his illness into the lesson plan. Dying, in other
words, as a teachable moment.

His decision to teach, and his school district's determination to
let him, introduced Dennis Frederick and his classroom to the world.
His story drew reporters and television news crews to his classroom
door. And what he taught his children touched a much broader audience.
His was a lesson on death and how to face it, but so much more: It was
a lesson about life.

Frederick continued to teach at Pleasantview until November 11,
Veterans Day. By then, the pain was unrelenting. He was too exhausted
to stand. He started to say goodbye.

T o find Dennis Frederick's home at Christmastime, follow the star.
The modest frame house is just down the block from the towering display
on the hill. In the living room is a Christmas tree decorated mostly
with an assortment of bear ornaments. Against the far wall stands a
Baldwin upright, with Czerny studies and Beethoven sheet music propped
on the stand. Potted plants and a "Praying Hands'' statuette top the
divider between the living room and the dining room. Frederick's wife,
Sandy, is in a back bedroom overseeing homework with the couple's two
sons, Sam, 10, and Andy, 6. The boys' artwork graces the walls.

On the bookshelf near the front door, in a place of prominence, is a
small placard that reads: "If you pause to think, you'll have cause to
thank.'' An odd sentiment, perhaps, for someone facing death at a young
age.

He's tall—six feet, two inches—but he now looks frail,
almost birdlike, his face pale and creased.

When Frederick emerges from his bedroom, he shuffles over to the couch
and gently lowers himself onto the cushions. He's tall—six feet,
two inches—and though he once carried 190 pounds on a solid,
athletic frame, he now looks frail, almost birdlike, his face pale and
creased. He knows that his appearance is unsettling—he describes
himself as "gaunt"—and he quickly moves to set his visitor at
ease, speaking about his life and his illness with almost childlike
openness.

Dennis Frederick was born in Dover, Delaware, the middle child of
Ronald and Patricia Frederick. His father was an Air Force mechanic,
stationed at the nearby military base. In the mid-1960s, when he was
about 7, the family moved to northern Minnesota to be closer to
Patricia's ailing mother and began to put down roots in the town of
Chisholm. As a high schooler, Frederick started at center for Chisolm's
basketball team, a longtime powerhouse. He averaged 10 points a game
and won all-district honors. In his senior year, Chisolm fell two wins
short of making the state tournament.

Like many athletes, Frederick found a role model in his coach, Bob
McDonald. "I patterned my life after him,'' Frederick says. "The
similarities between the two of us were always there. We believe a lot
of the same things. He gets the most out of you. He takes a little and
does a lot with it. He always puts his heart and soul into everything,
and I try to do that, too.''

McDonald, still rolling over opponents after more than 30 years of
coaching, remembers Dennis Frederick fondly. "He was always one of my
favorites, a dedicated kid who gave you leadership. He was always
striving to do more. Everybody in town remembers Dennis as someone who
would always give the maximum.''

Frederick earned a physical education degree from Bemidji State
University in north-central Minnesota, but it wasn't until he started
teaching a Bible class at his church on Fridays that he turned to
teaching as a career. "I had 26 4th grade boys,'' he remembers. "And I
just had a blast. I really liked it, so I went back and got an
elementary education degree.''

Religion would continue to play a pivotal role in Frederick's life.
Although he grew up a nominal Methodist, Frederick later developed a
conservative, fundamentalist outlook, a view shared by his wife, whom
he met at Bemidji State. Frederick's a straight arrow: Much of his
personal and family life now revolves around the nearby Fellowship
Bible Church. Like anyone else facing death, he hopes and prays for a
miracle. But if one fails to materialize, he believes grace will lead
him home. "Jesus Christ has given me an understanding of what I'm going
through,'' he says, "and He has eliminated any fear that I have because
I know that He is with me totally. He's been working in my life, and
I've seen evidence of that. There's no reason to be afraid. It's like
having Superman there.''

P leasantview Elementary School is a sprawling complex of pods,
built around the time school architects began designing buildings that
resembled NASA mission control rather than dingy, hollowed-out
monuments of granite. In the hallway across from the school's main
office is a large framed photo of Frederick, his co-teacher, Deb
Kawlewski, and 24 smiling young faces. Frederick, down on one knee,
towers a good six inches over the tallest student.

Dennis Frederick's classroom is attached to the back of the school,
in one of those modular "temporary'' facilities that in most schools
have become all too permanent. In a far corner of the room is
Frederick's desk, outfitted with a Macintosh work station. Behind the
desk is a large bulletin board, covered by powder-blue construction
paper, decorated with bold, yellow block letters proclaiming: "Mr.
Frederick, you are the best.'' Pinned to the board is a student's
pencil sketch of the teacher. Everything about this child's-eye view is
larger than life—big head, hair, glasses, teeth, ears. A photo of
Dennis Frederick, his wife, and two children hangs above the drawing.
Off in a corner is a poster of Michael Jordan poised in mid-dunk. A
snapshot of the teacher's head is taped over Jordan's face. His
Airness, Mr. Frederick.

Frederick is known for nudging his students along with positive
motivational techniques and his offbeat, gentle humor.

Frederick taught at various levels for seven years before he came to
Pleasantview in 1991. Assigned to one of the 3rd grade classes, he
began to make his mark. "It's an age I can adapt to,'' he says. "I just
click with those kids. I've taught 4th and 5th grades, along with some
junior high and high school, and I can honestly say 3rd grade is where
I belong. It's where I fit.''

Friends and colleagues agree. Always the coach, Frederick is known
for nudging his students along with positive motivational techniques
and his offbeat, gentle humor. Tall and skinny, he's not above suddenly
striking a goofy, storklike pose to get their attention. He's proudest
of his use of "wow'' cards, which are awarded for good behavior and
redeemed by the children for little toys and other prizes. Above all,
Frederick is an unapologetic believer in catching children in the act
of being good.

That's not to suggest Frederick's a softie. He still expects hard
work. "I've always wanted to help kids enjoy learning and to reach as
far as they possibly could, whatever the challenge,'' he says. "My
whole philosophy is to try as hard as you can and then let God do the
rest.''

Brad Olson, Frederick's best friend and a fellow 3rd grade teacher,
taught next door for years. Frederick, he says, is the best teacher
he's ever worked with. "Listening to him through the wall, you could
just hear the excitement."

Frederick had little doubt he could maintain that excitement this
year, but he knew he might have to convince others—particularly
parents—that a 3rd grade classroom was the proper place for a
dying man. Even more, a dying man who planned to speak frankly with 7-
and 8-year-old children about the disease that was eating away at his
body. Frederick told his principal, Jean Clark, that he intended to
teach for as long as he could stand. Clark and Sauk Rapids
superintendent Greg Vandal met with Frederick to draft a plan for his
return to the classroom—a plan that included putting clergy and
mental-health professionals on-call to support students and staff,
hiring a co-teacher (Deb Kawlewski), and assembling the parents of
Frederick's 24 students for a meeting before classes began in the
fall.

At that meeting, Frederick told parents that he intended to speak
honestly to the children about his illness and impending death. "I
wanted parents to know that this was not something I was going to
skirt,'' he says. "I was going to pay homage to what I was going
through. I told them that when a teachable moment came up, I was going
to talk about it.''

Not one parent objected. No one removed a child from Dennis
Frederick's class. And so he taught.

Despite the district's carefully constructed plan and Frederick's
determination to teach at his best, the year didn't start well. The
first week of school, he was too ill to take his place at the head of
the classroom. Kawlewski stepped in, gently beginning the long period
of transition, carefully explaining why Mr. Frederick wasn't there.

The next week, though, Frederick returned with newfound vigor. "He
became a stronger teacher coming back this fall, no question in my
mind,'' observes Jean Clark, who visited the classroom often. "He
taught like every day was his last day. The amount of energy he put
into it was just exhausting. He put his entire heart and soul into
everything he did. His lessons were even more exciting than before. He
could take a simple science lesson that may have been ho-hum before and
turn it into something magical.''

For Kawlewski, who had never met Dennis Frederick before this year,
the first few weeks were eye-popping. "In the beginning, he seemed so
strong and so energetic, and his teaching style was so filled with
enthusiasm, you just couldn't tell the man was dying of cancer. There
was a lot going on here, and the kids loved it.''

But as the weeks wore on, Kawlewski could see how the performance
sapped her co-teacher's strength. "He had his down times, too,'' she
says. "The last couple of weeks, I could tell he was getting tired a
lot. If he was up there teaching, you probably couldn't tell. But at
the end of the day, after the kids had gone, he'd be up in the front of
the classroom, exhausted and in pain.''

Jeff Meade is a Philadelphia-based writer and a frequent Teacher
Magazine contributor.

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